Los Angeles County Contracts

Increasingly pessimistic about the federal government's willingness to keep Los Angeles County's public health system solvent, the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday voted to freeze all hiring and contracts in their Department of Health Services should Washington decline to extend its $1-billion waiver of Medicaid rules.

Six months after yanking a $250-million contract with Pacific Bell from its agenda because of problems with the telecommunications giant's work for the state government, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors is poised to approve the mammoth deal today. County officials say they have toughened their contract with PacBell and believe the deal remains the best for the taxpayers.

Sixteen months after pledging to use private companies to help locate parents who either are owed or are behind on their child support, the Los Angeles County district attorney's office Tuesday won approval of two $418,000 contracts to supplement its own $150-million operation. For five months, county supervisors--particularly Mike Antonovich, a political opponent of Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti--have been urging the prosecutor's office to produce the contracts for board approval.

Los Angeles County will open bids March 21 on a project to seismically reinforce the bridge over Big Tujunga Canyon in the Angeles National Forest. The project will include repainting a portion of the bridge on Big Tujunga Canyon Road overlooking Trail Creek. The cost of the project will be covered by federal and state funds, county Supervisor Mike Antonovich said. Work is expected to begin in June and be completed in December 2001.

Los Angeles County today is expected to take a significant step toward becoming the largest jurisdiction in the nation to privatize parts of its welfare reform program. A majority of the Board of Supervisors have stated their support for taking bids from private companies to run some of the job training and placement program for welfare recipients who are about to be cut off.

Southern California's shrine to motor cars, the Petersen Automotive Museum, would survive under a tentative agreement reached late Monday that involves a $25-million gift from its namesake. Publishing magnate Robert E. Petersen and his wife, Margie, offered the gift from their private foundation to pay off the money-losing museum's debt under a plan that would turn operations over to a new nonprofit foundation.

Los Angeles County on Tuesday balked at signing a $250-million contract with Pacific Bell to install a new countywide computer system after a story in The Times about the telephone company's troubles running a statewide computer network.

The owner of a computer company gave a friend in Los Angeles County's child welfare agency a $25,000 check to buy a new Mercedes four months after winning a $4-million contract from the department, according to a confidential audit obtained by The Times. In addition, auditors found, Tedjitou Dessalegn received $5,000 from the computer company and was assisted in obtaining a car loan.

The Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved a $2.5-million boost in the county's contract with Lockheed Martin IMS to run the district attorney's child support computer. Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti, whose office endorsed the increase, has received more than $15,000 in donations from Lockheed employees for his reelection campaign. The increase was opposed Tuesday by Supervisor Mike Antonovich, a perennial critic of the district attorney.

Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti's reelection campaign received a total of $15,000 from 21 Lockheed Martin IMS employees, most of whom live out of state, a little more than a month before the prosecutor's office recommended that the Board of Supervisors pay the company an extra $2.5 million for running Los Angeles County's child support computer system. The supervisors are scheduled to act on Garcetti's recommendation Tuesday.